The End Of The World?

H

harry

At the Start
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Apr 16, 2005
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Just watching the news and the country seems to be under water.
Is the end of the world coming?
I'm very scared cry
 
I also live on the top of a hill but on Friday we were only inches away from having water coming through our back door. The back garden slopes downwards towards the house so water was pooling up outside and I've no doubt that if it didn't stop raining when it did we would've been under water too.
 
Lots of the staff can't get to Emilys school this morning so it's closed. The older two are at the school across the road but that's open, much to their disgust. Plenty of roads still closed near me, the A420 to Swindon is closed as there's about 5 foot of water on the road under the railway bridge and the road into Lechlade at the bottom of my road is closed due to a jolly great big hole being left where the road was washed away!
 
They're all due to finish tomorrow after lunch. Mollys sports day has been cancelled for the second time now as it's raining and Emily was supposed to have a 'summer holiday' themed picnic & party today at school. Never mind, we'll just have to eat the food we bought for it instead :D
 
Originally posted by Desert Orchid@Jul 22 2007, 11:22 PM
I live at the top of a hill about 600' above sea level.

I'm alright, Jack.
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I too live at the top of a very large hill. Hasn't stopped it flooding badly in places.
 
Well the lunchtime news suggested that the "waves were lapping at the walls of the University colleges in Oxford" and that we were all on tenterhooks and rated as 50/50 etc. Since both Magdalen and Christchurch have about 30ft walls, which are ancient and very thick (I assume they're the colleges in question as they're the nearest to the rivers) I think there's a bit of dramatisation going on in the BBC helicopter.

Now admittedly I didn't make it in to work today, but that owed as much to the Oxfordshire motorists penchant for crashing cars on the A34 (what is it with them??? :angy: ) and the police's complete over-reaction every time they do so (why can't they just sweep them out the way and let the insurance companies sort it out, like the French do). The A420 was already shut for flooding which must have shifted some traffic onto the A34, and then a car broke down on the M40 slip road (police response?) close the motorway junction :angy: . Suffice to say I got as far as junction 9, and spun it round and went back, electing to work from home instead, rather than sit in a 4 hour traffic jam, since I'd only travelled 3 miles in 90 minutes.

Admittedly the surrounding fields will all be under water as the Thames usually breaches at certain known parts anyway, but there's no significant dwellings in the flood plain, so it probably looks worse than it is from the air. The Cherwell isn't particular deep and is rather slow flowing anyway, and that's the river that would put my rail link most under threat, but the last time I knew it was one of the few still operational going into Ox, even though the service is shite and only has 3 trains going out in the morning. The surrounding fields have been under water for months now anyway and the journey often feels like a boat trip as it is.

It's a bit of a shame as I rather fancied going to do a bit 'flood watching' as the power of nature always holds a degree of fascination for me, but since we're told it will be tomorrow lunchtime when the Thames is at it's highest I might take myself off to the 'head of the river' for lunch, (it's just that it's the most expensive pint in the country there cry )
 
Originally posted by Shadow Leader+Jul 23 2007, 11:11 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Shadow Leader @ Jul 23 2007, 11:11 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-Desert Orchid@Jul 22 2007, 11:22 PM
I live at the top of a hill about 600' above sea level.

I'm alright, Jack.
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I too live at the top of a very large hill. Hasn't stopped it flooding badly in places. [/b][/quote]
It's as much to do with the lie of the land and soil composition. Just along the road from us, after a downpour we can get large pools of standing water in fields, sometimes lapping across the road but it's hardly on the scale of what can happen near a river.
 
Originally posted by Colin Phillips@Jul 23 2007, 09:34 AM
Is this latest 'orrible weather down to global warming or whatever?
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I have a theory with regards why we have rising waters apart from global warming.....

Just remember you read it here, :eek: ................ :P

They build houses, estates, shops, factories, roads, bridges, etc by the thousand in many western countries and now in other countries too.....

Here goes ...Merlins theory ...you will all be aware! If rain was to fall on undeveloped land it would be a natural process for the waters to be taken in by a natural process of ABSORBTION.....

BUT NOW EVERY BIT OF LAND THAT IS TAKEN AND USED AS... any of the afore mentioned the waters that fall as rain is sent down the drains into the sea's, channels or rivers where ever the land as been built on...

At first one would think this as being too small to effect rising waters but one must consider the thousands of buildings, whether of the civil engineering type or factories and housing that have been erected.. there ends my theory..... :)

Now try and pick holes in my theory it would be very difficult to substantiate an alternative theory, excluding global warming and this added theory of mine......
 
Originally posted by Desert Orchid@Jul 23 2007, 05:58 PM
It's as much to do with the lie of the land and soil composition. Just along the road from us, after a downpour we can get large pools of standing water in fields, sometimes lapping across the road but it's hardly on the scale of what can happen near a river.
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Yes, parts of the village were flooded in a bad way - and I mean coming up to chest level on a horse, but are on the top of the hill and not near the river. The River Bourne at the bottom of the hill burst completely leaving that area under 5ft of water & the road shut. This area is all on clay so it takes some time for everything to drain.
 
I must admit Merlin "your theory" does have a ring of familiarity about it :suspect: It's also a little bit of a red herring as 'crazyhorse' might tell us? It's perfectly safe to build in most flood plains, the issue hinges on just what you build and to what specification (how you build it etc). Another aspect of course is what they do in the States (admittedly they have a bit more land than us) but they have upstream tracts which they've engineered to flood deliberately, and thus ensure rivers don't burst their banks in urban areas. It routinely saves St Louis. The final area that needs looking at is dredging out deeper channels or the widen of rivers and creation of braided overlaps channels.

Actually there's another area too that occurs to me, which concerns the over flow channels, streams, and various ditches dotted all over the country that have become clogged up with various debris, as I'm struggling to believe that these are dispersing water as efficiently as they might once have.
 
It's having such good drainage that causes flooding - I know it sounds totally wrong but the water from the city goes down the pipes, flows off the roads into the drains, then from there into the rivers, the river rises quicker than it can transport the water to the sea and it floods the surrounding houses.

Could cut flooding if the government hadn't allowed developers to build on flood plains though :(
 
Can you just clarify pleae Dom.

"coming up to chest level on a horse". This is the horses chest I take it? and not your own whilst sitting on the poor devil
 
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